What Now?
by Shiva-J
Summary: A secret from the past emerges that sends Tom Sloane into shock and forces him to think hard about what to do even as he emotionally falls apart.


**What Now?**

"So you asked me to come here to talk, so what's with the mute act?"

Tom just sighed at Daria's cutting words and flopped onto his bed and stared at the ceiling in response.

From his prone position Tom gained a view of Daria looming over him when she moved towards the bed, leaning over so her face was above his.

"Tom?" Daria said, worry creeping into her voice.

Daria had gotten a Birdseye view of Tom's face, wooden and marred by uncertainty, his green eyes dead and flat.

"I found out something today Daria," Tom spoke, his voice small and frightened, "And... Well..."

"What?!"

Tom sighed again, "Daria, just promise me you won't be angry or anything, because this happened a long time ago. And I honestly didn't know anything about it until today."

"Just spit it out, Tom." Daria said flatly, wanting to get the worst of it over. Whatever it was, since her first thought had been _cancer_, but now it seemed to be a muddle.

Tom blinked.

Then he began to tell her a little story.

"When I was fourteen I met a transfer student from Britain named Briar Belanger, she was a couple years older than me and one of the beautiful people."

"And you aren't?" Daria commented wryly.

"Ha, ha." Tom laughed flatly, then he continued.

"With me being me, and her being one of the most desired things at Fielding I shouldn't have had a shot but..."

Daria began to see some of the plot, but felt like she was missing the key piece.

"You know all those parties that I hate going to?" Tom asked and when Daria nodded added, "Well I got dragged to one and needless to say I was bored out of my mind."

Tom then smiled for the first time since this story began, "I managed to slip away and found a quiet spot to hide in, but about twenty minutes after that someone else came in looking for a place to get away from it all."

Daria muttered, "You didn't."

"Yes, we did." Tom said wistfully, "We started talking and she was a bit tipsy and before either of us knew it, well..."

"You don't have to go into details I get the picture." Daria informed him flatly, but her eyes flashed danger.

"Well after that night I didn't get to see her one to one like that, I tried but her family was a mess and they started divorce proceedings soon after that night and Briar had to go back to Britain."

"That was the last I saw or heard of her... Until tonight."

"Tom..." Daria began to say hesitantly, not sure where this was going at all.

Tom let out a deep breath and said, "Due to her situation she didn't pick up on the signs until it was too late to do anything about it and..."

Daria's eyes bulged as she came to one conclusion, "...No way."

"Way," Tom said with a voice that had no sense of direction, "They kept it hidden and passed it off on Briar's mother, but some reporter started digging and the Belangers figured that the game would be up soon so they decided to reveal it themselves."

"At least they had the decency to let us know before it gets splashed all over the tabloids." Tom added bitterly.

Daria gathered up her courage and asked, "So... the kid?"

"A boy," Tom whispered faintly, "I have a son and I never even knew. His name is Cuthbert."

Daria managed a very weak laugh, "I'm sure no one will make jokes about a name like that."

Tom cracked a grin, "Yeah..."

Then he fell silent, not sure what else there was to say.

Daria and Tom indulged in this oppressive quiet for a length of time that neither of them were ever sure the exact length of.

Then Daria broke it with by saying, "This isn't your fault."

"I know."

"And you didn't betray me or anything, because you didn't know."

Tom nodded, "But how you feel is different from how you think. Right?"

"How'd you guess?"

"Because I'm in the same position." Tom reminded her flatly.

"Touché."

The quiet threatened them again until Tom asked, "Where do we go from here?"

Daria shrugged, "I don't know, but I think we both need to be alone for the rest of the night."

"Ok." Tom stated very carefully, not sure what else would be safe at this point.

"Tomorrow we will go out for pizza and... we'll talk." Daria offered up lamely.

Tom nodded, "Sounds good."

Daria's face hinted at something that resembled a human smile.

After that they shared an awkward goodbye and Daria showed herself out.

Once she was gone Tom reached up to his pillow and pulled out something he had hidden under it when he had first heard the footfalls of booted feet.

It was a set of pictures the family had been given by the Belanger's middle man, a brief progression of the life of Cuthbert Belanger.

"I'll give you the Sloane name little guy." Tom said to the image of a baby boy with blondish hair and blue eyes that were turning green.

Tom then began to wonder what he'd be for the kid, he was three already and Tom had missed it and had never known.

"But that wasn't your fault Tom," a voice whispered to him, "You didn't know."

"Yeah, but now what?"

The voice whispered back, "You do the best you can and try not to fuck it up. It's all you can do at this point."

Tom shut his eyes and felt the tears beginning to well up.

He blinked and they began to fall down his face.

"I can't do this!" Tom whined, "I'm not even eighteen, I can't even take care of a plant, how the fuck am I supposed to be a Dad _now?!_"

Tom slowly curled up in his sheets and let the tears fall for a while before the wave of panic subsided.

His mind was aware and awake, but his body wasn't moving much, sleep didn't claim him.

Then there was a knock at his door.

"It's open." Tom groaned weakly.

"Thomas," his mother said as she opened the door.

She got one look at her son and fell silent for a moment before nodding to herself, and walked over to the bed and crawled into it, and before he could protest, pulled her baby-boy into a hug.

Kay Sloane said nothing to him, instead she just held him for a very long time.

Tom was the first to break the silence by saying simply this.

"I want to meet him."

He didn't need to elaborate on the 'him' involved.

"Of course you will," Kay cooed supportively.

"I want to be part of his life,' Tom added a bit more forcefully than before, "I... I don't jack about kids but if I don't try, I'd be even worse than..."

Tom then lapsed into silence.

He didn't see his mother beaming at him with pride, even though her eyes were filled with a strange sadness at Tom's situation.

She kept holding him until she felt him relax and his breathing fell into a regular pattern.

It took some doing but Kay managed to extricate herself out of the bed without waking her son up.

She then crept out of the room quietly and turned back one last time to look at him, and smiled a sad smile.

_"Oh Thomas,"_ Kay thought to herself, _"You've grown up more in a few hours than some people do in a lifetime, and it will only get harder from here."_

She then slipped out of her boy's room and shut the door behind her, letting him get a good night's sleep.

The morning was a few hours away and very uncertain.

In Tom's slumbering hands were a set of photographs, the most visible was one of a small toddler with blond hair and blue-green eyes playing in a pile of autumn leaves.

It was destined to become one of Tom's favorite photograph of Cuthbert.

Not even the crease where Tom had crumpled it in his sleep could take away from it's perfection.

But until the morning, it had to endure Mr. Sloane's grip as his body recovered from the shock of discovering that he had been a father for three years.

And he hadn't known a thing.

Tom still wasn't sure what his role would be in this situation, but as he slept something told him that he'd figure it out.

Somehow.

**FIN**


End file.
